Fish life after death

[Treefer32]

Well, my tank has stabilized after losing 14 fish. I have a Dragon Wrasse, Blue dotted goby, Black Tang, rabbit fish, and yellow coris wrasse left after losing 14 fish to an electric shock from one of my two heaters. I've since replaced both heaters with brand new Finex heaters.

So, now that things are stabilizing and the rest of the fish are doing well and surviving, my rabbit fish looked horrible. I thought for sure he's a goner. It's been two weeks since my last fish death and the Rabbit fish is still alive. I haven't seen him eat much of anything. I would think though, if he hadn't been eating anything in two weeks he'd be dead? He's got a bunch of tiny holes in his side. Probably about 10-15. Yesterday morning when the lights first came on, I noticed a slime over his top fin and a bunch of white dots hanging from the slime. As he swam around the near invisible film clung to him. Must have been sticky or something. He swam over to a power head and the sime and white things blew off him. I've also noticed him hovering by a bunch of cyano on the side of the tank. He changes his body color to match the cyano color and just hovers there. He looks deathly, until he notices me watching him, then he'll swim away from the cyano and change color to his usual yellow.

I did catch him on the web cam eating at some hair algae on some rocks. He used to be an extremely agressive eater and really doesn't eat much. There also didn't used to be a lot of algae on the rocks for him to eat.....

So, any idea what type of parasite has eggs in a "slime blanket" that clings to fish and can be blown off in a powerhead?

I'm afraid to add any more fish now, because these fish appear to be mutants immune to whatever could kill off 14 weakened fish from the electric malfunction?

I plan to make sure these 5 fish live over the next 3 months. By August or September I may try adding something new for fish. In the meantime I guess I'll keep adding corals.

My tank is a 350 gallon display, 6 ft long, by 3 feet wide and 31" tall. 3 52 AI LEDs with an Aquatic life lighting fixture with 4 T5 coral special bulbs.

I had a ton of cyano and hair algae grow in while the fish were dieing. (I couldn't get to their stupid corpses as they died. Would go into rock caves and vanish and didn't want to tear everything down.

My Turf Scrubber has been going nuts. Growing massive amounts of hair algae (a softball sized ball every 3-4 days). It's finally beating the nutrients in the display as hair algae is falling off the rocks now.

Any suggestions on reef safe treatments or just see if these fish survive and let things stabilize?

 

[Big G]

The slime you observed might be your fish's mucous coat. After all its been through the coat may be a bit excessive in production.

I have the Finnex Titanium heaters on my tank. Very constant temp.

Do you have a CUC going at your algae outbreak? Trochus, Ceriths and Nerites are my favorite combo to keep things manageable. Plus your Rabbit Fish should be of help.

Not a big fan of chemical treatments for algae. Elbow grease, water changes and a bit of time should work out in the long run. Remember, nothing good happens fast in this hobby.

 

[Treefer32]

I agree on the slime coat. The snails I have none but some necarious snails due to my dragon wrasse, he creates circles of shells... With empty shells... that may have once had inhabitants. he's an awesome fish, but, really annoying! As bad as an engineer goby!

 

[Treefer32]

A small celebration today! My Rabbit fish for the first time in two weeks ate frozen Rod's food. I've been feeding it daily, my other fish all eat, but the rabbit fish due to parasites and most likely being in a lot of pain would not eat. Today he fought my tang for food. He didn't just eat, he aggressively ate! The damage done by flukes or whatever it was is slowly healing. I hope, with any luck that he's on the road to recovery. I haven't lost any fish now in close to 10 days. I had a massive hair algae outbreak which is now slowly dieing off. My scrubber is continuing to pull tons of nutrients out of the water. Most of my corals are looking good still and some looking much better now that cyano is no longer growing on them. Even better! I think things are on the mend. Just need the hair algae to vanish now... I would think it will quickly dissipate with only 5 fish in 400 gallons of water!

 

[Mical]

My foxface came up with a mysterious gash and bump(s) on his side and acted similar. Hardly ate, skittish and was formerly an aggressive eater. Did a couple of teaspoons of PraziPro and he's active and eating like a horse.

 

[Bigfish of La.]

You need to add ground probe.

 

[Treefer32]

You need to add ground probe.

Yup, that's next.